Friday, 31 October 2014

Making Work Pay?
What role can the welfare state play in raising living standards?

A half-day free conference to be held at Congress House at 1.30-4.30pm on 8th December.

Lunch available from 12.30 and the conference will be followed by a drinks reception.

At
a time of rising high underemployment and falling average weekly
earnings, low-paid workers and their families now account for a majority
of people living in poverty. But with the public finances
under continued pressure, employment policy and welfare reforms need to
work together to achieve change.

The
conference will discuss the two new key reports that consider the scale
of this challenge, as well as debating how it could be met. The authors
of the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s
Cumulative Impact Assessment of recent tax and welfare reform
will present key findings from their analysis, and the Office for Budget
Responsibility’s Head of Staff will set out the findings from the OBR’s
first
Welfare Trends Report.

Speakers include:

·Peter Brant,Acting Director of the Secretariat to the Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission

·Richard Exell, Senior Policy Officer, TUC

·Alison Garnham, Chief Executive, Child Poverty Action Group

·Andrew Hood, Research Economist, Institute for Fiscal Studies

·Andy King, Head of Staff, Office for Budget Responsibility

·Jonathan Portes, Director, National Institute for Economic and Social Research (tbc)

·Howard Reed, Director, Landman Economics

The conference will be chaired by Nicola Smith, TUC Head of Economic and Social Affairs.

A free drinks reception after the event will provide space for discussion and networking.

Title above by Swheatie of the KUWG

The letter introduced below is from Martin Francis' Wembley Matters blog and published online to help compensate for the fact that the Brent & Kilburn Times has not recently included a letters page. A major problem arising from present day deprivation of today's young poor people is that it conspires to prepare them for a life of drudgery and low expectations.

The future for our young people?

Friday, 31 October 2014

Stonebridge: So much more than just a playground

United in the battle to save Stonebridge Adventure Playground

The Kilburn Times is playing a gteat role in publicising and
supporting the fight to save Stonebridge Adventure Playground.
Unfortunately they have not had a Letters Page for several weeks so I
print below a letter I sent them:

It has been gratifying to see the Brent & Kilburn Times getting
behind the local community's fight to save Stonebridge Adventure
Playground.

I recently attended the Wembley Connects forum where we were invited
to shape a vision for the improvement of the borough. One strong
theme that emerged was the need for social spaces where our diverse
population could meet, share common interests and learn about each
other. It was argued that this would help produce community
cohesion and solidarity.

Stonebridge Adventure Playground is such a space where generations
of children and their parents and carers have mixed and shared each
others company in an area of disadvantage. It was noteworthy that
Doug and Glynis Lee's MBE nomination for their work on the
playground was from grown up children who had helped them build it
back in the 1970s.

Unite members prepare for a further 10 days of strike action in their fight to maintain quality services!

St Mungo's Broadway have made no effort to resolve this dispute and the
workers are determined to preserve quality services for the homeless
and resist the imposed detrimental changes to their terms and
conditions.

The workers have only just finished a week long strike in an attempt to get management back into meaningful talks.

This EDM asks for support for the workers and also calls on the
executive and Board of St Mungo's Broadway to honour their recognition
agreement with Unite and act to resolve this dispute immediately.

Aside from the blatant unfairness between huge pay rises that top
bosses have recently recieved, including £30,000 pocketed by the new
Chief Executive whilst new project workers seeing their pay slashed by
£5,000, workers are deeply concerned at the long-term negative effects
of the proposals that will result in cheap labour, downgraded roles and
staff working under minimum standard policies and procedures.

Meanwhile, no longer isolated, I was celebrating my birthday with friends from Kilburn Unemployed Workers Group outside North Kensington Jobcentre Plus — or, as we have dubbed it, 'North KenSanctions Slave Centre' in the Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea. That is somewhat in the 'beyond' bit of our operating area definition of 'Brent & Camden & Beyond!' (Our heartland of Kilburn is split between the boroughs of Brent & Camden.) And we were there with our blogger friend and Honorary Member Kate Belgrave (all the way from SE London), reflecting on the huge gulf between the Metro freebie newspaper's 29 October banner headline "Migrants 'ready to die for your British benefits' — Mayor of Calais warns MPs of growing crisis" and what we actually hear from jobcentre customers — especially at the North KenSanctions Centre! (I wish there was a gagging law against purveyors of such nonsense, while the owner of the newspaper group of which the Metro and Daily Mail are a part lives outside the UK.)

The sad fact in response to those words attributed to the Mayor of Calais — apart from the facts of people fleeing wars in their native lands — is that sanctions and fear of sanctions is making people traumatised and too ill to work or do pointless jobsearch, and more and more people are being driven into daily signing on with fluctuating signing times that make for no real quality time in jobsearch and a very punitive system, especially at the NKS Slave Centre. How much of that can anyone humanly take?

At that sanctions centre more than any other so far, we encounter people who have been sanctioned. (Usually elsewhere it's people who have been threatened with sanction if they do not comply with what the jobcentre 'adviser' has told them they must do, which is often far more than the claimant is really legally obliged to do.)

As per our official motto: "Never attend anywhere official alone!" exercising my liberty in support of social and economic justice gave a new context to my attending a jobcentre on my birthday as the progress I have made in life from the time that I was going nowhere as a disabled person who really wanted to do something meaningful in my life but not able to in a world that has laws against disability discrimination but no real enforcement of those laws.

New post on Carer Watch's blog

Opposition Day Debate and disabled people

by Carerwatch

There was an Opposition Debate
yesterday in the House of Commons – called by Labour on a motion to
condemn the recent statement by Lord Freud about disabled people
possibly working for less than the minimum wage. Lord Freud has since
apologised and the motion was lost.

However
for those of us who have been watching the debates on Welfare Reform
since 2007 – it was chance to see how far in some ways we have come and
how far in others we haven’t moved forward at all.

For
the first few years of welfare reform no one had a clue what it would
be like in reality. All we had was Freud and James Purnell talking pure
theory.

That
has certainly changed. All MP's now have a deluge of disabled
constituents coming in to their surgeries, and they have found out what
it is about. So the debate is finally informed amongst MPs. Yet still
they do nothing.

Haringey Council loses to local campaigners in Supreme Court battle over 2012 Council Tax Consultation

HARINGEY COUNCIL LOSES TO LOCAL CAMPAIGNERS IN SUPREME COURT BATTLE ABOUT 2012 COUNCIL TAX CONSULTATION.

The Supreme Court has unanimously allowed the appeal against Haringey
Council’s 2012 council tax consultation and declared it unlawful.
However they have not ordered the council to undertake take a fresh
consultation.

“This is a powerful win for local campaigners who opposed the
taxation of benefits by Haringey Council. The council is taxing the
lowest benefits that are needed for food, domestic fuel and shelter. The
judgement leaves the council free to re-consult all the residents about
whether council tax should be increased by an average of 86 pence a
week to restore the 100% council tax benefit for the poorest residents.
Alex Rook of the lawyers Irwin Mitchell and I believe that should now
happen” said The Rev Paul Nicolson.

"On the 7th October I was given leave in the High Court to seek a
judicial review of the £125 costs imposed by Tottenham Magistrates at
the request of Haringey council on late and non payers of council tax
1000s at a time whatever their means. National and local governments
have ignored the oppressive impact of council tax and its enforcement."

Subject heading above by Swheatie of KUWG

Content below from Ellen Clifford at Inclusion London

StopChanges2ATW – Westminster rally

Wednesday 29th October 2014 : 12 – 1pm: Old Palace Yard

On
Wednesday the DWP select committee is holding its final oral evidence
session for its inquiry into Access to Work. Mark Harper, Minister for
Disabled People, will be giving evidence.

The
StopChanges2ATW campaign will be attending the evidence session as
observers and then holding a rally in Old Palace Yard to protest against
changes to Access to Work that are driving Deaf and disabled people out
of employment and undermining our employability.

Speakers
will include Andy Greene, Disabled People Against Cuts, Geraldine
O’Halloran, Inclusion London and co-founder of StopChanges2ATW, Jenny
Sealey, artistic director of Graeae Theatre Company, , David Buxton CEO
of the British Deaf Association.

Saturday, 25 October 2014

From Z2K — Justice for vulnerable debtors

Crisis report finds homeless people ‘Turned Away’

I was delighted to attend the launch earlier this week of homelessness charity, Crisis’ new research
into the treatment of single homeless people by local authorities. The
research was carried out by people who had formerly experienced
homelessness themselves “mystery shopping” 16 local authorities in
England to check the quality of advice and assistance they provide to
single homeless people. Crisis found that, while in 37 out of 87
visits, applicants were given adequate advice and assistance, in the
remaining 50 they were not. Most of those were in London.

The report was introduced by Crisis’ new Chief Executive, John
Sparkes, and MPs from each of the main three political parties set out
their response to its findings. But it was formerly homeless, “Danielle”
who stole the show. In a powerful presentation, she set out not only
the difficulties she had in getting council officers to properly assess
her situation, but the slew of jibes and negative comments she endured
at their hands. On one occasion, she was told to go and ask a group of
men hanging around outside the offices if she could stay with them.

From Martin Francis' Wembley Matters blog

Preface by Swheatie of the KUWG

LB Brent is one of the London boroughs targeted by a racist Home Office witch hunt and Brent Anti-Racism's demonstration and awareness raising exercise in Wembley this morning cannot get everywhere.

So I have decided to post the start of Martin Francis' blog piece about the matter on this blog, concluding with a link to the full blog post on the Wembley Matters blog. The KUWG blog has viwers around the globe, and so hopefully there will also be viewers from the other London boroughs targeted.

The Home Office may have threatening arms, but the KUWG currently has a global following that should include the other London boroughs where the current ethnicity-based witch hunt is taking place.

And Swheatie wishes to point out that the London housing crisis arises more from successive UK government's under-investment in social housing stock, taxpayer-subsidised Right to Buy's erosion of social housing stock, and the greed of global capitalists who love gambling on shortages and spongeing off the UK state in their own ways.

Brent is one of five London boroughs to be chosen as the target for
Operation Skybreaker. This follows targeting of the borough by racist
organisations such as the BNP, Britain First and the South East Alliance
and by the UK Border Agency and Home Office through the racist van and
raids on tube stations.

Today the Brent Against Racism Campaign (BrentARC) will be in Wembley
Central distributing the leaflets below informing the public and
businesses about their rights regarding Operation Skybreaker.

More 'armchair activism', this time from 38Degrees

Swheatie's preface

I have just signed the below, adding the paragraph:

My country's Government backs TTIP but that same Government is a coalition without a mandate for the savagery of the cuts to public services that it is committing. Those cuts make a mockery of the coalition constituent parties' commitment to equality for disadvantaged minorities, particularly sick and severely disabled people.

And concluding:

Please also work to ensure that the EU commission website is much more accessible to disabled people.

What use is EU equalities legislation if it is to be waived aside by the whim of global corporations that pursue and exacerbate inequality?

Please be aware that the KUWG accepts no responsibility for such content as requests for financial assistance on other sites that it has links to.

38 Degrees write:

Great news. It
looks like the EU is wavering on TTIP - the dodgy EU-US trade deal.
Jean-Claude Juncker, who’s due to start a new job as the new EU
Commission President, is hinting that ISDS could be removed. That's the
bit of the deal that allows corporations like McDonald's or Marlboro to
sue our government. [1]

This is one of the worst parts of TTIP - getting rid of it could help us see off the whole deal. But there’s a problem: our government is lobbying to keep it in. [2]

Right now, we need to show that the UK government isn’t speaking for us,
the people of the UK. Thousands of us have already written to the EU to
tell them that ISDS should be dropped. And it looks like it’s finally
sinking in - so let’s not let our government undo our hard work.

The deal was locked behind closed doors - only politicians and big businesses were supposed to hear about it. Together, we’ve changed that.
We’ve signed petitions, we’ve spread the word about TTIP in our
communities and we’ve put it firmly on the agenda of our MEPs. [3] And
its paying off.

As Juncker takes office as the new EU Commission President, we can show
him that he can stop hinting - we’ll support him removing ISDS from the
deal. If we flood his inbox now, he’ll be left in no doubt that
the idea of McDonald's or Marlboro suing our government is a no go
area.

Friday, 24 October 2014

This
case was kicked off by a telephone call to lawyers from The Rev Paul
Nicolson, a resident of Haringey, on behalf of Taxpayers Against
Poverty. I was concerned that one of the alternatives to the draft
council tax reduction scheme, about which the 2012 consultation took
place, did not include was the option of increasing the average band D
by 86 pence a week which would have kept the 100% benefit for low income
households in work and unemployment.

We
now have the unfair 20% of council tax on benefits, which takes away
with one hand what has been given with the other, on top of the 1%
freeze, the bedroom tax, rent due to cuts in housing benefit, increasing
rents and the escalating prices of food and domestic fuel.

On
top of that imposition on the lowest incomes in the borough the
Magistrates imposed £125 costs on 27,882 households in 2013/14, the
first year benefits were taxed. The bailiffs then add to the impossible
debts a minimum of £75 and another £235 for a visit.

Those
£125 costs are now subject to judicial review in Nicolson v Tottenham
Magistrates & Haringey Council. The High Court leave was given on
the 7th October.

NB.
the council tax reduction scheme (CTRS) devised by local authorities
replaced the council tax benefit (CTB) administered by central
government in the Local Government Finance Act 2012.

In Haringey 20% of council tax was imposed on benefit claimants in work and unemployment from April 2013.

The Supreme Court is expected to hand down next week (29 October) a key ruling on the proper approach to consultations.

The case of R (on the application of Moseley (in substitution of Stirling) v London Borough of Haringey specifically
considered consultations conducted under the Local Government Finance
Act 1992 in respect of proposed ‘council tax reduction schemes. These
schemes were introduced to replace council tax benefit.

The
appeal considered whether a fair consultation required that consultees
be informed not just of the proposals of the local authority, but also
of the reasons for the proposals.

It
also considered whether consultees should be given sufficient
information to enable them to critically examine the thinking that led
to the proposals.

The
case arose out of Haringey’s consultation upon its council tax
reduction scheme. The Government subsequently announced a Transitional
Grant Scheme (TGS) but the authority adopted its council tax reduction
scheme without re-consultation.

Haringey argued that the Transitional Grant Scheme did not affect the draft scheme.

Thursday, 23 October 2014

From the Media Office of Jean Lambert, London's Green Party Member of the European Parliament*

PRESS RELEASE

For Immediate Release

October 22, 2014

UK Green MEPs reject new European Commission

The new European Commission has today been accepted by the EuropeanParliament but was voted against by many MEPs, including the UK’s threeGreen MEPs.

The Greens/EFA political group in the Parliament opposed the appointment ofthe entire Commission. Two of the appointments causing concern for the UK’sGreen MEPs is that of Miguel Arias Canete, a former Spanish minister whohas family ties to the oil industry. Canete was dubbed “senor petrol head”[1] by The Sunday Times and was today appointed Commissioner for theposition of Climate and Energy. Another is the appointment of Lord Hill ofOareford, but the Greens’ criticism go beyond individual Commissioners.

Jean Lambert, Green MEP for London, said:

‘We have seen the cost of growing inequality across the EU and we arebeginning to appreciate the true cost of ignoring climate change. With aglobal climate deal due in 2015, I am not convinced that this newCommission can face the challenges before us. I cannot see the joined-upthinking needed to lead the EU on a more just and sustainable path, so Ivoted “no”.’

Keith Taylor, Green MEP for the South East, said:

‘The appointment of an oil baron with past and present links to the fossilfuel industry as Climate Commissioner makes a mockery of European politics.Europe’s response to climate change is of global importance, but thisappointment inspires no confidence.’

Molly Scott Cato, Green MEP for the South West, said:

‘The withdrawal of responsibility for bankers' bonuses from Lord Hill'sportfolio demonstrates why he is entirely inappropriate for this role. Theonly way that he could be acceptable as European Commissioner for FinancialStability, Financial Services and Capital Markets Union is if everythingthat the UK Government opposes in terms of financial regulation wereremoved from his brief, which would leave him nothing to do.’

* Swheatie of the KUWG is a Green Party member, while KUWG is non-party-politically aligned. But what does the alignment of the European Commission members say about where this trading block is heading?

Tuesday, 21 October 2014

Placards designs by Swheatie of the KUWG

The above placard paraphrases feedback on a recent Kilburn Unemployed Workers Group from a friend of Swheatie who recently attended a KUWG meeting to find out about people who are poor from themselves rather than from statistical studies. (Kwuggies is one of many nicknames KUWG members have for themselves and each other.)

Whoever devised the system by which JobSeekers Allowance claimants are obliged to attend the jobcentre/slave centre every day at alternating times, did they do it to enhance the mental health or employment prospects of the daily attendance fodder?

Another KUWG Honorary Member, blogger Johnny Void, writes that the DWP has launched another boring 'grass up your neighbour' campaign that allows the real megabucks benefit fraudsters a very easy ride.

Are the perpetrators of such campaigns pleased with their correlative impact on disability hate crime?

While the Gagging Law is now an Act of Parliament, taxpayers money is being used to further hate crimes against disabled people.

With all the attacks on poor people through the benefits system, what is the 'end game' of these attackers?

Every Atos 'Medical Examination Centre' should have a warning placed outside it

From Henrietta Doyle of Inclusion London — promoting equality for London's deaf and disabled community

Inclusion London has been asked for examples of the impact of bedroom tax on
disabled people in London by Labour London assembly members. I would be
very grateful if you could send any cases you are willing to share to me
at: Henrietta.doyle AT inclusionlondon.co.uk. All the examples will be anonymised so the identity of the person won’t be revealed.

Many thanks,

Henrietta

Henrietta Doyle

Policy Officer

Mobile: 07703 715091

Direct line (Wednesday’s only) 020 7036 6033

Office Tel: 020 7237 3181, SMS: 0771 839 4687

www:

Visit
our new Power Up Project website for information on free training and
events for London’s disability sector run by Inclusion London and
Transport for All. www.powerupproject.org.uk

Inclusion
London is a London-wide Deaf and disabled people’s organisation
promoting equality for the capitals 1.4 million Deaf and disabled people
and providing capacity building support to London’s Deaf and disabled
people's organisations.

Great
informed and organised protestors from Unite Community & Radical
Housing Network mainly. A lot of the MIPIM people going in
seemed
genuinely bemused that their 'good deeds' (Regeneration) could be
criticised, but many took leaflets.

David Cameron later apologised for the former investment banker Lord Freud's remarks, saying that they were not a true reflection on the views of the Tory Party. A Yahoo search and my long term memory bring to mind and historical record Philip Davies MP (Tory) using disabled people's potential lower productivity as an argument against the use of minimum wage legislation:

A Tory MP has sparked anger by suggesting that disabled people should work for less than the minimum wage to increase their chances of being taken on by employers [see footnote].

Philip
Davies told the Commons: "If an employer is looking at two candidates,
one who has got disabilities and one who hasn't, and they have got to pay them both the same rate, I invite you to guess which one the employer is more likely to take on.

"Given that some of those people with a learning disability
clearly, by definition, cannot be as productive in their work as
somebody who has not got a disability of that nature, then it was
inevitable that, given the employer was going to have to pay them both
the same, they were going to take on the person who was going to be more
productive, less of a risk.

"My view is that for some people the national minimum wage may be more of a hindrance than a help.

"If
those people who consider it is being a hindrance to them, and in my
view that's some of the most vulnerable people in society, if they feel
that for a short period of time, taking a lower rate of pay to help them
get on their first rung of the jobs ladder, if they judge that that is a
good thing, I don't see why we should be standing in their way."

And I note that under the original 'descriptors' for the 'Work Capability Assessment' through which I won a tribunal for Employment & Support Allowance eligibility in 2009, I scored 15 points — the full threshold amount! — for a descriptor regarding time taken to execute tasks. That factor had been a major bug bear and cause of friction between scapegoatist co-workers and me in my first waged job, as they complained that the amount of time I took to complete tasks was so slow that the section manager assigned tasks to them instead of me, and that I should be forced to take a wage cut to compensate them!

And note also that it was Labour DWP Secretary who signed off the authorisation for the 'harsher test' in 2010 before the General Election of that year to 'simplify' the 'Work Capability Assessment'. (Sheffield Forum: Even harsher new ESA Medical approved.) And so under such legislation, slower disabled workers are not protected against the potential financial abuse that they could be exposed to by being short-changed under quantitative 'piece rate' that epitomises capitalism's orientation toward only valuing people in an instrumental sense — as means of production.

What about an hourly rate that is laid out on the basis of valuing people in terms of their commitment to taking part?

Yet what does Lord Freud's talk of paying disabled people as little as £2 per hour and compensating them through Universal Credit say regarding the matter of juggling 'protecting the vulnerable' with the Tory mania for an 'overall benefit cap'?

So, maybe, yes Lord Freud should be sacked, but who is going to replace him and what will they espouse as the future for disabled people in a capitalist system under which people are only valued in terms of their quantity of output?

* The views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of Kilburn Unemployed Workers Group

Thursday, 16 October 2014

Placard and accompanying text by Swheatie of the KUWG

"Given indefinite sanction" = Given fuck all service

Any obscenity relating to the above placard design is really in the lack of 'customer care' in the way that economically vulnerable people are treated at the so-called 'North Kensington Jocentre Plus', and in the orders they are given from 'on high'.

Being forced into daily signings on with fluctuating attendance for allegedly spending too long on JobSeekers Allowance is one thing when there are not enough waged jobs around. But bullying claimants into handing over their Universal Jobmatch password is an illegal act, so why do they sanction a person for defying that order?

Tuesday, 14 October 2014

By Swheatie of the KUWG

Civil Service should really mean just that.

This Wednesday the KUWG were to join any picket line that may exist at Kilburn Jobcentre on the national strike day of the Public & Commercial Service Union (PCS). PCS includes salaried jobcentre staff.

But in the meantime we received a request from someone associated or formerly associated with North KenSanctions Slave Centre [officially known as North Kensington JobCentre Plus]. And on our tour of duty there on Wednesday 8 October we had an overwhelming realisation that our presence is urgently required at that place to help bolster the quality of customer service delivery — we have decided to do our 'secondary picketing' there this week. So to we return to that place whatever we call it, near Ladbrok Grove Stn, in Kensal Road, W10 5BL.

Secondary picketing is a form of bridge building

(Bringing together social work practitioners, service users, academics and students toward rescuing social work from the clutches of managerialism and privatisation is the mission of Social Work Action Network. Similarly, KUWG wants to cooperate with jobcentre workers in rescuing jobcentres from the clutches of market driven 'welfare reform' — and to remind the civil servants involved what the customers really want and that they are there to serve the public rather than millionaires.)

'Secondary picketing' — i.e., picketing by people not of the trade union immediately involved in a strike — was perceived correctly by the Thatcher Government as being against the perceived mission of that Government and so of course they sought to abolish it. (Not that that mission was transparently stated with all the media manipulation involved and talk of 'the enemy within' after the defeat of an Argentinian military junta that had been financed and armed by successive UK and US Governments before going a little too far in its own military ambitions after it had 'disappeared thousands upon thousands of Argentinian citizens.)

Claimant status doesn't invalidate human rights

Enough of the Modern History lesson. In much more recent history, jobcentre staff have been threatened and bribed to clamp down on the right of claimants. The contract between Monster Jobs and the Department for Work & Pensions under which the 'Universal Jobmatch' program was created states that the claimant has an inviolable right to their password privacy — echoing what is already in the Data Protection Act.

Password privacy yours by right

But under sanctions performance targets and a chain of bullying that DWP Secretary Iain Duncan Smith denies exist, jobcentre staff frequently demand that claimants tell jobcentre staff their password. ("Never believe anything till it has been officially and vehemently denied"?) Once the staff have access to the claimant/customer's password, electronic surveillance of the jobseeker is made much easier.

Yet at North KenSanctions Slave Centre, staff all too routinely tell claimants/customers that they will be sanctioned if they do not give over their 'Universal Jobmatch' password.

The KUWG wants to remind all jobcentre staff that if they don't join with claimants in claimants' struggles, it will be all too easy for the privatisation of jobcentres into the clutches of companies like G4S and Serco to continue. Employment Minister Esther McVay has already shown a keenness for contracted staff on the Supervised Jobsearch Pilot scheme to be given license to sanction claimants. That was previously only something that staff directly employed by the DWP could do. But as she gives privately contracted staff 'employment officer' status, what next for the jobcentre staff in their struggle against privatisation?

So where is the job security for jobcentre staff in 'only following orders' as Nazis did?

Whose side are North Kensington Jobcentre staff on — in an economic climate in which even the most diligent of JSA claimants, stripped of a real work environment's networking opportunities toward professional advancement, are more likely to be sanctioned than find another job within six months?

By Swheatie of the KUWG

Who ever voted for MIPIM UK?

When people voted for their councillors, mayors etc., did they have any inkling how the people they voted for would be wined and dined by property developers who are more interested in investing in puppets than furthering democracy?

KUWG members will be celebrating the launch of No to MIPIM UK

Jet-setters are just not domesticated

People who have too many homes and who squander others' ability to find a place to live by gambling on and exploiting 'supply and demand' are not really fitted to be world citizens, anywhere that they happen to be.

Housing Benefit tenants are not 'useless eaters'

Chancellor George Osborne and his ilk represent housing benefit tenants very much like the Nazis portrayed disabled people — as burdens on society. In fact it has been the mercenary nature of offshore landlords and the collusion of mainstream television companies with the concept of home ownership and 'buy to let' housing that have drainedd the public purse for private profit and corporate bail out of irresponsible lenders. See Mike McNabb's very revealing analysis of a Daily Mail article about Somali asylum seekers, and how the reporter's lack of due proportionality leads readers — and subsequently voters — astray with its messaging. Link to Asylum seeker's £2m home: but who's playing the system?

Global parasites strip us of our assets

Poor people are all too frequently portrayed as parasites. As a Quaker, I believe there is something of God in every person. (KUWG is not a religious organisation but includes people who are religious and spiritual.) But in the sense that what people live for is to a large extent what they become, the wealthy lay themselves open to being described as parasites.

If, like us, you believe children should learn about money from their
school and family – not from irresponsible payday loan advertising -
please join us and take action by lobbying a Lord. We’ve only got a few
weeks left to change the law to protect children.

Thank you for your support,

Katie Curtis,

The Campaigns Team

The Children’s Society

P.S. You can read more about why we believe payday loan advertising
has a negative impact on children and families in our report, Playday not Payday.

Sunday, 12 October 2014

The Oct | Nov 2014 issue of Red Pepper magazine has a special feature on 'GERM' (the Global Education Reform Movement') and revealing that it has little really to do with the 'choice' that its advocates claim it promises.

Here is a snippet of the article 'Teacher Training' by Anna Wolmuth based on an interview with teacher and anti-GERM activist Lois Weiner. Surely, what Lois Weiner says regarding classrooms could as easily apply to jobcentres and the establishments to which jobcentres consign benefit claimants deemed unworthy of any 'lifestyle choices' and at taxpayers' expense?

Teacher Training

Anna Wolmuth talsk to US teacher and writer Lois Weinver about what the UK can learn from global education struggles

"If we fail to make the unions what they should be, most students... will be trained for a life of mental labour, poverty, or imprisonment." This is the stark warning given by Lis Weiner in her book The Future of Our Schools. The lifelong teacher union activist, based in New York , believes teachers' unions have the potential to halt the global assault on education but only if they are radically transformed.

The attacks on public education in the US are strikingly similar to those we are experiencing in the UK. Weiner, and others working in the field, see them as part of a global project to recast education as a profitable service sector of the economy. According to Weiner, "Education is a very lucrative sector, one of the last sections that isn't marketised, and they're after that."

The increased marketisation of education is not part of a secret agenda, but is openly discussed in business journals, Wall Street and World Bank and IMF documents. Weiner points to a 2002 World Bank report that identified teachers and teachers' unions as 'the biggest threat to global prosperity'. "When I used to say this people laughed but nobody laughs now because they realise that teachers have been targeted." The thinking is that teachers 'capture' government and use their power to block privatising reforms. An essential pillar of the GERM project is to destroy and weaken teacher trade unions as they are potentially the most powerful resistance."

A different kind of union

Trade unions have clearly not managed to block these reforms, however, and Weiner argues that to do so "we need a different kind of union." The problem with teaching unions in their current form, she suggests, is "not just a matter of cowardly or confused union teachers, which is not to say they don't exist, but it runs deeper than this."....

To continue reading this article, get or order a copy of the Oct | Nov 2014 issue of Red Pepper magazine from your local newsagent or from Housmans Bookshop, 5 Caledonian Road, N1 or from Bookmarks Bookshop, 1 Bloomsbury Street, WC1B 3QE. The price is £3.95.

Meanwhile, Swheatie notes parallels between the situation of teachers and their students, and cites the development of Social Work Action Network as aiming for the field of social work what Lois Weiner advocates in the form of collaborations between teachers' unions "and parents and students in challenging neoliberal policies."

Note also that one of the major players in the GERM project is publishing company Pearson, that owns the Financial Times. What does that say about the need for transparency among the corporate world?

Commenting on Blog Contents

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Please note if I respond to comments it is in my Google log in — never 'Anonymous'

Commenters cause less confusion when they use their own names or pen names. A host of 'Anons' can give very mixed messages. Even if you use the technically easier 'Anonymous' button to make a comment you can still put your name at the end.

Benefits sanctioned? Take mass action!

An average of 1700 benefit clamants are sanctioned per year in each London parliamentary constituency. One of them might be writing parliamentary candidates in your polling constituency right now. How about more people who are sanctioned writing candidates in your parliamentary constituency and asking relevant questions at 'hustings' debates in your area?

Meeting structure

Helping you feel at home: We meet weekly in the Small Hall at KingsgateCC and start gathering from 3pm, attempting to start the meetings at about 3:15pm and definitely before 3:30pm.

Bring and share refreshments are included. We are not like the 'No eating or drinking on the premises' jobcentre.

The formal meetings start with firstname and what benefit we are on or a one-liner about what brings us to KUWG. (Pensioners and other allies welcome.)

We then ask for casework from those present, arrange who will help with what case, and go onto discussing campaigning leafleting and such outreach activities. We also arrange who will do the chairing or facilitating and note-taking for the following week. Rotating these roles helps minimise the risk of being dominated by one person and helps us build our skills as we share the workload.

Meetings actually finish at about 5:20pm to allow for putting tables and chairs back and leaving the kitchen facilities ready for the next group.